Collaborative workbench for managing data from heterogeneous sources

• US 10,097,597 B2
• Filed: 06/28/2013
• Issued: 10/09/2018
• Est. Priority Date: 01/08/2009
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Veritas Technologies, LLC (Whitehouse Group Ltd.)
• Original Assignee: Veritas Technologies, LLC (Whitehouse Group Ltd.)
• Inventors: Chandrasekhara, Vasu, Eberhart, Andreas, Kraus, Stefan, Walther, Ulrich
• Primary Examiner(s): Truong, Dennis
• Application Number:
  US13/930,377
• Publication Number:
  US 20130298045A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,929 Days
• Field of Search: 707736, 707608, 707603, 707999102, 707E17005, 707E17048, 345440, 706 45, 715230, 715243, 715273
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/258 Data format conversion from or to a database
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/90332 Natural language query formulation or dialogue systems
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 16/9038 Presentation of query results
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 65/403 Arrangements for multi-party communication, e.g. for conferences data switching systems for conference H04L12/18; arrangements for connecting several subscribers to a common circuit, i.e. affording conference facilities H04M3/56; television conferencing systems H04N7/15

Abstract

Disclosed is an exemplary computer program application, system and method for a unified approach to managing data from heterogeneous sources. The system includes a central, semantic data storage basing on a directed labeled graph model, a module for accessing data sources by drawing access and mapping configuration from the data storage and loading the resulting data into the data storage and a unified user interface that treats each graph node in the data storage as a separate term, visualizes and modified the term'"'"'s context in the data graph using configurable user interface widgets.

Claims

1. A computer-implemented method for collaboratively modifying data for presentation in a multiple user environment, comprising:

obtaining, by a computer processor, webpages and associated metadata from multiple data sources, wherein, for each of the webpages, the respective associated metadata of the webpage includes information identifying relationships between data elements of the respective webpage with each other or other data elements, wherein the data elements are obtained from the multiple data sources as changes to the data elements at the multiple data sources are detected;

for each of the identified relationships, generating, by the processor, a representation of the respective relationship, the respective representation including a representation of the data elements related by the respective identified relationship and including a representation of a further data element representing the respective data source from which the webpage including the data elements of the respective identified relationship were obtained, wherein an updated representation of the respective relationship is generated as the changes to the data elements at the multiple data sources are detected;

storing, by the processor and in a memory device, the generated representations;

presenting, by the processor and in a display device, a graphical user interface in which each of the data elements of the stored generated representations is user selectable, in response to which selection data is displayed according to one or more relationships to which the selected data element belongs;

the presenting includes displaying a graph including nodes representing at least a subset of the data elements of the generated representations and including edges between data elements of the at least the subset, the edges being based on the generated representations;

responsive to user-selection, generating a modified graph by modifying edges of the graph including performing at least one operation selected by the user from the group consisting of editing an edge, deleting an edge, and creating a new edge; and

pushing modifications to respective data sources based on the modified edges of the graph.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the edges correspond to an intersection of document with a widget or a document with another document.

3. The method of claim 2, wherein edges extend between nodes representing data elements of webpages obtained from different ones of the multiple data sources.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein:

different ones of the data elements are user-interactable by execution of different ones of a plurality of executables; and

the method further comprises storing each of the data elements, storing a set of relationship types, storing a plurality of second data elements that correspond to respective ones of the executables, and storing representations of respective relationships between one of the second data elements with another of the data elements, the respective relationships identifying one of the relationship types.

5. The method of claim 1, wherein deletions or edits to existing data are forwarded to the data source that provided the information.

6. A computer-implemented method for collaboratively modifying data for presentation in a multiple user environment, comprising:

obtaining, by a computer processor, webpages and associated metadata from multiple dynamic data sources, wherein, for each of the webpages, the respective associated metadata of the webpage includes information identifying relationships between data elements of the respective webpage with each other or other data elements, wherein the data elements are obtained from the multiple dynamic data sources as changes to the data elements at the multiple dynamic data sources are detected;

for each of the identified relationships, generating, by the processor, a representation of the respective relationship, the respective representation including a representation of the data elements related by the respective identified relationship and including a representation of a further data element representing the respective data source from which the webpage including the data elements of the respective identified relationship were obtained, wherein an updated representation of the respective relationship is generated as the changes to the data elements at the multiple dynamic data sources are detected;

storing, by the processor and in a memory device, the generated representations;

presenting, by the processor and in a display device, a graphical user interface presenting a semantic graph representation in which each of the data elements of the stored generated representations is user selectable in a graph having edges extending between nodes representing data elements of webpages obtained from different ones of the multiple dynamic data sources, in response to which selection data is displayed according to one or more relationships to which the selected data element belongs and wherein the graph representation responsive to user-selection, modifying the graph to generate a modified graph by modifying edges of the graphic visualization by performing at least one operation selected from the group consisting of editing an edge, deleting an edge, and adding an edge; and

applying changes to at least one of the multiple dynamic data sources reflecting the modifications of the graph edges of the modified graph;

and wherein the modified graph is further updated based on the updated representation of the respective relationship that is generated as the changes to the data elements at the multiple data sources are detected.

7. A computer-implemented method for collaboratively modifying data for presentation in a multiple user environment, comprising:

obtaining, by a computer processor, webpages and associated metadata from multiple data sources, wherein, for each of the webpages, the respective associated metadata of the webpage includes information identifying relationships between data elements of the respective webpage with each other or other data elements, wherein the data elements are obtained from the multiple data sources as changes to the data elements at the multiple data sources are detected;

for each of the identified relationships, generating, by the processor, a representation of the respective relationship, the respective representation including a representation of the data elements related by the respective identified relationship and including a representation of a further data element representing the respective data source from which the webpage including the data elements of the respective identified relationship were obtained, wherein an updated representation of the respective relationship is generated as the changes to the data elements at the multiple data sources are detected;

storing, by the processor and in a memory device, the generated representations;

presenting, by the processor and in a display device, a graphical user interface displaying a graphic visualization of nodes of data elements having edges based on the generated representations wherein edges extend between nodes representing data elements of webpages obtained from different ones of the multiple data sources;

responsive to user-selection modifying edges of the graphic visualization by performing at least one operation selected from the group consisting of editing an edge, deleting an edge, and adding an edge; and

responsive to user interaction with the graphical user interface to modify the edges of the graphic visualization, modifying at least one attribute associated with at least one of the data representations and applying the changes to the at least one of the multiple data sources.

8. The method of claim 7, wherein:

different ones of the data elements are user-interactable by execution of different ones of a plurality of executables; and

the method further comprises storing each of the data elements, storing a set of relationship types, storing a plurality of second data elements that correspond to respective ones of the executables, and storing representations of respective relationships between one of the second data elements with another of the data elements, the respective relationships identifying one of the relationship types.

9. The method of claim 7, further comprising:

using, by the processor, the generated representations to push data modifications, entered via user-interaction with a graphical user interface representation of one or more of the data elements, to respective data sources identified in the representations that identify the one or more data elements.

10. The method of claim 7, wherein the edges are displayed as hyperlinks.

11. The method of claim 7, further comprising mapping the multiple data sources to a common data format.

12. The method of claim 11, wherein the common data format includes creation time, creator, and data source.

13. The method of claim 11, wherein the mapping includes a mapping of raw data dependent on at least one of a syntax and semantics of an output.

14. The method of claim 11, wherein the mapping associates terms and relations of a data source to terms and relations of a data storage.

15. The method of claim 7 wherein the nodes of the graph are derived from a document address.

16. The method of claim 7, wherein each data source has an associated location address, operation to invoke to obtain the data, and credential for accessing the data source.

17. The method of claim 7 wherein the data elements are reloaded when a data change is detected.